


The Ultimate Sacrifice

by Thessalian



Category: Dragon Age
Genre: Gen, References to Suicide, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-24
Updated: 2011-12-24
Packaged: 2017-10-28 00:26:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/301726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thessalian/pseuds/Thessalian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Imprisoned for ending the life he worked so hard to save, Zevran gives his own impressions - and explanations - of the final battle, and the death of the Dalish Warden.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Ultimate Sacrifice

**Then**

Alistair stared for one brief moment as the top of Fort Drakon exploded into a pillar of pure white light. Then, once his heart had started beating again, he ran, swatting darkspawn out of his way with his father's sword and his mentor's shield, terrified of what he would find when he reached the top.

 _I didn't want to,_ he told her in the very back of his mind. _It was just the only way. We all do what we have to; you always said that--_

Dragonbone armour was lighter than it had any right to be, and he reached the top of Fort Drakon before he even knew it, noting in an abstract sort of way that he seemed to have slipped and fallen into a heap of eviscerated darkspawn at some point along the line. (He vaguely recalled a little voice asking, "Enchantment?" but that was how he knew he was going insane with worry and battle-stress; there was no way in the world that Sandal was anywhere near this carnage, unless it was as a darkspawn's last meal.) There was a great deal more of the same at the top of the tower. Darkspawn corpses lay everywhere, eviscerated and beheaded and in some cases simply exploded. There were other corpses, too - smaller, sadder corpses of Denerim guardsmen, dwarves in the armour of the Legion of the Dead, and the occasional mage. More bodies were littering the ground, but those appeared to be predominantly whole, and breathing, and occasionally groaning in pain.

He searched for his fellow Warden but Arl Eamon Guerrin caught his eye first, trying to struggle to his feet despite weariness and heavy armour. Alistair moved to help the Arl right himself, but for all his concern for the man who'd raised him, the first words out of his mouth were, "Where are they? Where is _she_?"

Eamon winced a little at the motion, but tilted his head to the left. Alistair looked over to see a huge dark shape silhouetted against the coming dawn. _The archdemon,_ he thought. _Strange I only saw it once in the flesh while it lived, when it's defined my life for so long now..._ He turned his attention back to Eamon long enough to hear the Arl say, "Go. I'll tend to those I can."

Alistair didn't need to be told twice. He let go of Eamon gently, to make sure the man could bear his own weight, and then sprinted across the top of Fort Drakon towards the titanic corpse and what he might find there.

Or, more to the point, _who_ he might find there.

He encountered Wynne first; she had evidently been thrown a goodly ways by whatever shockwave marked the archdemon's passing. He nearly knelt to her; he was fond of the Circle mage, but she opened her eyes, looked at him and then waved him on, attempting a smile to reassure him that she would be fine. Alistair glanced around, saw the First Enchanter on his feet and stumping towards Wynne using his staff for support, and carried on. First Enchanter Irving could do more for Wynne than Alistair could, and he knew it.

He didn't see Oghren, though the dwarf had been wearing Legionnaire armour and might have blended into the pile of Kardok's men bowled into a far corner. Or it might have been that Alistair only had eyes for the smallish, lithe figures standing at the very edge of the rooftop. Two elves - one short-haired woman and one long-haired man, both blond from what little he could tell from silhouettes and fading mage-fires and the coming of dawn. Two elves, engaged in a struggle far too close to the edge of the tower, and one of them was his sister-in-arms, his best friend, his lady-love and the woman he'd marry if the stupid Landsmeet would let him.

Alistair tried to yell, but his throat locked up as events unfolded too fast to stop. While it was impossible to tell whether she had been actively pushed or her assailant had allowed her struggle for freedom to be the death of her, it didn't change the outcome. Lyna Mahariel went off the edge of Fort Drakon to join the corpse of her fellow Grey Warden, Riordan, hundreds of feet below.

The one elf remaining turned to face Alistair, who could only stare in horror, and said, with his heavy Antivan accent and a weary sort of resignation, "The Antivan Crows send their regards."

 

 **Now**

Zevran Arainai sat in a cell in Fort Drakon, the last place in the world he wanted to be. He stared at the walls, finding them surprisingly clean. The torture area far below seemed relatively free of gore as well. It puzzled him, given the tales he had heard of a certain daring escape from this particular dungeon, and he mused aloud, "Perhaps the Grey Wardens were prone to exaggeration? Where are the whips and chains? I might have felt more at home."

"Remember, Zevran, that they sent a queen to be imprisoned here." The voice was female, soft and surprisingly gentle, with a heavy Orlesian accent. "They would have cleaned this place and provided comforts for Anora. There are formalities and courtesies to be observed when royalty is involved, no?"

Zevran turned his face away from the bars of his cell with a mirthless chuckle. "Ah, Leliana. I assume you are here to tell great bardic tales of the punishments I am to receive for my treacherous ways. Or you thought, in a fine act of Andrastrian charity, to provide a condemned man with a ... _pleasant_ memory to take to his death? Ah, had I known that it would take such a thing as this to earn your company in my bed ... as it were," he added, glancing at the straw on the floor that made his current sleeping place, "who knows what might have come of it."

Leliana rolled her eyes; Zevran couldn't see it, but he heard it in the tutting sigh, and the impatient note in her voice when she asked, "Ugh; do you _ever_ stop talking about ... that?"

"I am merely condemned, beauteous Leliana," he said. "I am not yet dead. So, it is not so. Such a pity." He thought it over. "You perhaps thought to release me, then, that I might flee to Antiva. Which, by the way, seems to be a habit with you; all that talk of redemption with our stoic Qunari companion. I should tell you, fair Leliana, that such would be a fate worse than death ... though death would come eventually," he added, calm and amused and mostly to the wall. "To assassinate a Grey Warden is ... impolite. To assassinate a Grey Warden after she has completed the act of ending a Blight ... well." He snorted another tiny, empty laugh. "I assure you, my fate at the hands of King Alistair will seem a holiday compared with what the Crows might do. Or perhaps not," he added, contemplative. "He bore such love for our new Hero of Ferelden, you know."

Leliana looked at Zevran for a moment. Even though he was not returning her gaze, he still felt her regard on him, those Bard's eyes that saw so much more than they appeared to see. It made him distinctly uncomfortable, but he had borne worse, and would bear worse still before the day was done. He endured.

Then, Leliana said, "I came to ask you _why_."

The question earned her another mirthless chuckle. "I am a Crow. It was a contract, no more. Think you the Crows have no honour at all? I merely sought Taliesin's end for ... reasons of a personal nature." He thought of Rinna and narrowed his eyes at the wall. "The Grey Warden might have known better than to trust one such as I."

Another impatient little tut drifted into the cell through the bars. "You are a terrible liar, Zevran."

"Oh, I don't know about that," he said, and tried not to stiffen. "I travelled with your group for quite some time with no one the wiser of my upcoming treachery. Consider, Leliana. All of Thedas would have perished under a Blight. This includes my beloved Antiva. It seemed a worthwhile thing to protect the Grey Warden until such time as she could gather her armies and end this Blight before it did harm to my homeland."

"Such a _terrible_ liar." Leliana shook her head; Zevran's keen ears caught the sound of her hair brushing the shoulders of her armour. "If all that were true ... why did you speak to Morrigan in the castle's courtyard the night before the forced march out of Redcliffe?"

Zevran's eyes widened and he turned to stare at Leliana, shock breaking through his insouciant facade. "How did you know about that?"

The Bard smiled and gave a musical little laugh. "You elves are not the only rogues amongst us, Zevran Arainai of the Antivan Crows. Do you think you are the only one who stalks the shadows in the night, for fun and for profit? Besides, I would have had watch that night, and habits of a year do not die easily." Her expression became sober. "I overheard your conversation with Morrigan. I did not understand it all, but ... I think that you saved her life. Facing down a mage that has gained the power that Morrigan had this year ... Zevran, there was no profit for you in killing Lyna, and after what you did ... none of it makes any sense. And I know that Alistair will likely not listen to you. So I came to ask you why. Why Morrigan, why Fort Drakon ... just ... _why_?"

Zevran narrowed his eyes at Leliana, hating her a little for her logic and her keen intuition. This was so much worse than Rinna, somehow, for all the love he bore Lyna Mahariel was not quite of that same stripe. Then his shoulders sagged and he leaned the back of his head against the wall. He tilted his head to the ceiling, closed his eyes and sighed. This, perhaps, was his true penance - not the death that was to come but being forced to speak of this his ultimate failure. "Very well."

 

 **Before**

The dog snarled and struggled against the leghold trap in which its leg was caught. It was not a flimsy one as normally used by hunters; it was a sturdy thing, suitable for holding a human, and it hurt. The dog knew that such traps could be wriggled out of, but it would take far longer as a canine. She wanted _out_ \- out of this trap, out of the castle, out of the city, and out of this Blighted land.

"Ah, and Morrigan of the Wilds shows her true form at long last," came a voice from a clump of bushes off to her right. "To think of all those times we called you this very thing in our long travels across Ferelden." The dog looked up to see Zevran amble over to the trap, a swagger in his steps and a small smile upon his lips. "And you never did learn how to look for a trap, did you?" He tutted in a playful tone. "You should perhaps stay with us just a little longer, to learn such a valuable skill, lovely Morrigan."

Morrigan growled at Zevran with her dog's throat, then took her human form, wrenching her leg free of the trap. "Zevran. 'Tis ... unexpected to find you here. Should one with your appetites not be at the local tavern, trawling for bar wenches? Or perhaps 'tis chasing the chambermaids that interests you, as the Dalish holds our coin for the armies."

"All our coin bar the five sovereigns you purloined from the Grey Warden, at least," Zevran told her with a smile. "Fear not, Morrigan; your secret is safe, and at this late date, I do not imagine that the loss of five sovereigns will inconvenience the Redcliffe troops overmuch. No, I came to speak to you of your proposal to fair Lyna." Morrigan stared at him with incredulity, and he grinned. "Oh, come now, Morrigan. The morning brings marches for we who will see this task through to its end, and this castle was, only hours ago, under siege by darkspawn. I would not wish for the leader of our armies to suffer fatigue because she was obliged to keep watch for the minions of this archdemon. As to our good friend Alistair ... I rather hope that he shall have ... other things - equally dangerous but far more pleasurable - to occupy his evening."

Morrigan bared her teeth at Zevran and turned away. "If you heard the conversation as you claimed to, you would know that ... that he refused me. I suppose 'tis a hazard of dealing with those trained by Templars, this fidelity. And he is content to let his lady-love die of his own stiff-necked ignorance ... or perhaps die himself, though I imagine that _she_ would not allow it. They deserve each other," she added in a bitter undertone.

"Ah, but had you been in my position," Zevran told her, "able to move nimbly and with such grace over the rooftops to reach the window of the king's bedchamber, my dear Morrigan, you would have come away with a different tale entirely. You see, Lyna was not given the opportunity to even mention the proposal that you yourself feared to bring to him. He spoke disparagingly enough of you that perhaps she felt that there would be little profit in it."

Morrigan stared, then growled. "I did not fear to bring it to him. I simply anticipated that he would refuse me out of spite, without even hearing me. 'Tis typical that he would do such even to his love when my name was mentioned." She swore under her breath. "I thought her a woman of more common sense. It seems I was mistaken. She deserves her fate, then. It shall be on her own head, and upon that of King Alistair the Naive."

"It shall not." Zevran's face took on a cast of sudden seriousness. "If you fear to bring this proposal to our Templar-king--"

"I do not _fear_ to--"

"--then I shall bring it to him myself."

Morrigan subsided and stared at Zevran as if he had claimed that he would walk to the moon and back. After a long moment in which she struggled for words, the apostate asked, "And what makes you so certain, Zevran, that Alistair would hear you when he would not even allow Lyna to ask the _question_? 'Tis highly unlikely that he thinks any more of you than he does of me."

"Ah, but Lyna only refused to ask the question out of respect for her love's rather ... blinkered ideas of such things," Zevran pointed out. "Whereas I have no particular regard for the sensibilities of our new king and would happily scandalise him out of general principles. As to why he would not refuse my request," he added with a shrug, "love excuses much, and makes possible even the ... distasteful. I would not be here otherwise."

Morrigan greeted that with a raised eyebrow. "I confess myself surprised. 'Tis obvious you and she were never intimate."

Zevran chuckled, but there was no mirth in it, though it contained no bitterness either. "Oh, I don't know about that," he told Morrigan. "I find that there was much of intimacy between Lyna and myself. I have fought at her side for near on a year now, my dear Morrigan. She knows my every trick, can anticipate my every move upon the field of combat, and I hers. One might say that such requires more of intimacy than the act of love. Besides," he added, more quietly, "when someone shows interest in more than your skills, martial or otherwise ... when she speaks to you, and bids you speak of a past that most would disdain ... when she shows no moral judgement ... shows, in point of fact, understanding and even compassion of a sort... I would as soon bed a sister as bed Lyna, as things now stand, and I am more than content to leave things as such." He gave her a shrewd look. "When you spoke to her, it seemed to me that you yourself might have a ... passing understanding of such things, Morrigan."

Morrigan stared at him through most of his speech, incredulous, but when talk turned to the matter of sisters, she closed her eyes and bowed her head for a moment. "I ... understand such things," she admitted in a voice that barely rose above a whisper. "I understand what it is to find ... a sister."

"Then allow me to speak on your behalf." Zevran had the advantage, and he knew it, and his training served him well in the matter of pressing an advantage, exploiting a weak point. "Surely you would not have a sister die because of the thick skull and narrow mind of some king ... would you?"

For a long moment, Morrigan merely stared at the Antivan elf. Then she sighed, and made her decision.

* * *

"I'm dreaming, right? Or ... hallucinating because I'm so tired." Alistair shook his head. "You _can't_ be suggesting what you sound like you're suggesting."

Zevran leaned against the wall, arms folded, mirroring Alistair's posture. "Ah, Alistair. Such a face does not become you. You look as though someone served you haunch of genlock at a formal banquet. She is a truly formidable woman, and pleasing to the eyes. Would it be such a chore to bed one such as her, in a cause such as this?"

"More like a death sentence." Alistair gave the Antivan elf a stubborn look. "I hear how some spiders eat their mates' heads after the deed is done. And you _know_ what she turns into."

With a derisive snort, Zevran pushed himself away from the wall and moved to sit on the bed. "It might be death for you, though I myself am inclined to doubt it. But to _not_ do so ... well, that is death to her. Is that your wish, Your Majesty? The death of the king's consort? Ferelden's great hero, and that of the Dalish people? I wonder what the clans would make of the knowledge that you allowed their bright and shining star to charge to certain death simply because you feared to bed a woman. As she is like to be a princess amongst the Ferelden people, and thus a political link between the Dalish and the Fereldan population, might it not be a form of political suicide, to lose her now?"

Alistair turned to face Zevran with a snarl. "I don't _care_ about the political implications, you arrogant ... sneaky..."

"How eloquent," came a female voice from the doorway. "I see you have learned no better insults since the day we met. 'Tis a sad thing, for one who would speak for his nation to have no suitable words."

Zevran, lounging on the bed now, raised an eyebrow as Morrigan entered. Alistair, however, showed no such restraint. He stomped over to Morrigan and loomed over her, trying for threatening although he knew that, despite his warrior's physique and Templar training, he held no threat to her. "What. Do. You. _Want_ from me?"

"For you to see _reason_ , Alistair." Morrigan met his glare with one of her own. "If you lie with me, in this ritual, tonight, your lady-love need not die. 'Tis that simple."

After glaring at her a moment longer, Alistair turned his face away from Morrigan, not wanting her to see the emotion behind his eyes. "She ... won't die anyway. I won't let it happen."

"Will you not?" Zevran laughed from his insouciant position in the bed. "I can hear it now! 'No, Lyna Mahariel, you _shall_ not go to face the Archdemon! You will allow the man you love - and, of course, King of all Ferelden - to take the final blow; you shall watch, helpless, as I undo all your work and commit suicide! And you will allow this because...' Well." He looked up at the ceiling at that, mock thoughtful. "None of that would actually be _said_ , of course, as she would hit you about the head before three words left your lips. Why, she would be into the fray before your vision cleared, I have no doubt."

"She would not let you." Morrigan, seeing the advantage handed to her by Zevran's words, pressed it mercilessly. "T'was clear long ago that she is stronger than you are. She _will_ succeed ... and she shall die. _Unless_ you partake in this ritual." She paused, more for effect than anything else, and then added, "She has risked all, time and again, for you and for this land. Would you do so much less for her? Would one paltry sacrifice be so much to ask?"

Alistair shut his eyes and lowered his head. Perhaps he imagined Lyna's quiet voice, giving wisdom and advice and quiet care while he grieved for Duncan; his rescue from the Fade; the fifteen sovereigns she had allowed him to take from their army fund to help his sister; every uncomplaining step she'd ever taken when the loss of Tamlen and of her clan must have acted like a dagger in her heart, and with such patience with his whining over what was, comparatively, so much less of a loss.

Or perhaps he simply heard her say, in a voice that almost longed for an ending, _Then I will take the final blow myself._

Whatever his reasons, Alistair raised his head and said, "...All right."

 

 **Now**

Leliana stared at Zevran as he paused. "...You're imagining the two of them, aren't you?"

For the first time, Zevran looked at her, taken aback. "I am _not_!"

"Zevraaaaaaaan..."

"Well ... perhaps a little. Though I imagine it was an uncomfortable experience for both, as things went." He turned his face towards the opposite wall of his cell again. "Beyond that ... well, you recall well enough how it went. None could bring themselves to tell Lyna how Alistair spent that night. Morrigan left - for where, I know not - so as not to earn suspicion, and had I been wiser, I might have told her myself that this ... ritual took place, as Alistair did not wish to say to her that he bedded Morrigan. Perhaps he felt that she might think it some miracle of the Dalish gods, or that she survived because she was tainted before this Joining of theirs. Perhaps he felt that she would forgive him the deed in her gratitude for her life, when it was saved in such a way."

A long moment of silence drew out between the assassin and the Bard. Leliana, who had studied the reactions of men and women alike as a matter of life and death, broke it. "...She wished to die."

After another long moment of silence, Zevran spoke a single, pain-broken word. "...Yes."

 

 **Then**

Zevran raised his head and winced. The bright column of light from the Archdemon, and the explosion that followed it, had taken everyone by surprise, and armies of darkspawn and Fereldans alike were scattered about the top of Fort Drakon in prone disarray. The darkspawn recovered first, but they chose to flee, no longer guided by the monstrous dragon that lay dead and oozing noxious blood on the stones before him.

Once the after-images of the light faded from his eyes, he dragged himself upright and searched for Lyna. It was not that he did not care for the others, precisely; he simply had to know if Morrigan's ritual had worked. He would not have put it past the witch to claim to a thing she could not deliver, just to have one last tweak of Alistair's nose. His cynicism did him no credit, he was sure, but it had kept him alive this long.

His fears proved unfounded. He saw Lyna stagger to her feet about two yards from the Archdemon's corpse, staring at it in utter disbelief. Then she looked at her hands, still all disbelief and shock, and then her eyes widened. She took two staggering steps backwards before she turned and moved to the very edge of Fort Drakon. She looked over the edge, and then at the mist-shrouded sunrise. Watching her profile, he saw her lips move - speaking a prayer, perhaps, in the broken Elvish the Dalish had so long preserved. And even in profile, Zevran saw something in her face that brought him to her side without his even realising he had moved. He took her wrist, deft and gentle and quick as he knew how to be, and said, "It is done, Lyna. Come away."

"No." Lyna wouldn't look at him. "This ... this isn't how it was supposed to happen. A Grey Warden must sacrifice themselves to end the Blight. There ... there was no..."

Zevran raised his free hand to her chin and turned her face towards his. "There was a sacrifice. But it was not a life, and it was not yours. Come _away_ , Lyna."

She reared back, pulled her face from his grip, and tried to struggle free of the restraining hand on her wrist. " _No_! This ... this has taken _everything_ from me now. _Everything_! I ... I can't..."

Zevran looked at her, and for one of the first times in his life, the glib, silver-tongued Antivan had no idea what to say. "Lyna..."

"He said, 'You must submit yourself to the taint for the greater good'." The words were spat, utter self-loathing. "We are of the _Elvenhan_! And never again shall we submit! But ... but I _did_! And lost clan and kin, and ... and Tamlen, _twice_ ... and Alistair, he doesn't..." She looked at him, and Zevran felt as though his heart were being ripped out of his chest by what he saw in her face. "I took my chance to die under open sky. And it was _taken_ from me. I will not submit to Morrigan's wishes. Never. Again."

Still he held her wrist. Still she struggled. There were voices behind them, voices that he recognised. The Arl of Redcliffe. And the King of Ferelden. She would die, one way or another. There was no doubt in his mind that, if he held her until Alistair came, she might come away ... but there would be a poison, or an accident in training, or some similar thing. Or perhaps she would continue breathing and pretending at a life, but she would die in all senses but the literal. While she would not want Alistair to suffer, knowing that she had taken her own life, that he was not enough to keep her here ... he was not. No one was, and it pained Zevran, in an altogether different way, as much as it would Alistair. He, however, was perhaps strong enough to do what Alistair would not, _could_ not do. He would set aside his own selfish wishes for Lyna and put an end to his sister's pain, begun more than a year ago and eating away at all of her life until nothing was left but an empty shell to wander the Deep Roads until something made of her a Broodmother. He would also save her reputation in the eyes of her people, and spare her lover at least some of the pain.

It was the most, and the least, and the only thing he could do. No accident or suicide would claim the life of the Hero of Ferelden.

So as she struggled, he said, so quietly that only Lyna could hear, "...Abelas, lethalan. Dareth shiral."

She looked into his eyes for a split-second, searching ... and then smiled. It was only the relief in that smile that let Zevran Arainai of the Crows do what he knew she wanted.

 

 **Now**

A rat scurried across the floor in a cell across the hall. It was the only sound in the room for quite some time.

Then, Leliana said, "...Hessarian, then."

Zevran closed his eyes, rested his head on his knees for a moment. "In a sense, I suppose. Strange to think of one such as I as a sword of mercy, but the world has become quite a strange place for me, this last year gone. I..." He sighed. "Had I been a better man, a wiser or a kinder man, perhaps I might have known a better way. I could have forged a path earlier, to ease her heart. Abused my contacts for further news of her clan, perhaps, or ... I know not." His voice was hopeless and despairing. "She suffered, Leliana. It ended when I pushed her. When I let her go."

Another long moment of silence stretched between them. Then Leliana asked, "You would not tell Alistair this, to save your own life? I doubt that Lyna would want to see you die for doing what she wanted."

Zevran turned to look at her, for perhaps the second time in the conversation, his eyes full of anger and desperation. "I shall _not_! And nor shall _you_ , my Chantry dove! To do so would break his heart and she would not wish that upon him. She loved him as much as she knew how to love one of the shemlen, Leliana! She would have spared him pain and if I can bear having slain _her_ , I can bear my own death if it gives her precisely what she wished! And what she wished was a clean end with Alistair never knowing--" He turned his face away with a sigh. "I suppose I could not stop you, were you set on such a thing, but ... know that she wished him not to know. Would you spit so on the wishes of your friend? Your noble, heroic, now-dead friend who can no longer speak for herself?"

Leliana looked at him, and then she spat in his face. "And whose fault is _that_?"

Zevran looked astonished for a moment, and then he heard it: the clinking of armour and the heavy footfalls of a man set on vengeance as well as justice. Alistair, and likely guards. His execution would be a public thing, he knew, and there would be an honour guard to keep a mob from tearing him to pieces. This must be them. He looked up, saw that it was true, and stood. As they led him away, with Leliana looking on, he let his eyes say what his lips could not without betraying what he'd really done - 'ma serannas'.

Leliana, skilled at reining in her emotions, waited until the last footsteps faded to bare echoes before she began to cry.


End file.
